Written by a current Gamestop employee who also happens to be a Shacker. Given my unending hatred for Gamestop, I found this to be an insightful read: --------------------------------

Bending The Rules:True Story: A woman got 360 on launch day with a reservation made in October because she threatened to sue due to bundles on website. Does this make her a decent person? No. Did this juice some other, more thoughtfull customer out of a 360 on launch day? Yes. Will she go to hell? I sure hope so.

GS does price match, but only within about 25%. Anything higher we turn away. This is also MoD's decision so sweet talking works well.

Almost anybody can bump up your trade in amount for as much as 10% without getting in trouble.

There is a "VIP" 20% bonus in TiC but only certain titles qualify so ask about it.

Due to the 7-Day return policy on used stuffs, you can actually forget your More Card at home and come back within a week with the card and the receipt to get the difference refunded to you. Maybe not worth the trip, but hey, it's possible.

Dealing With Jackass Employees:There is no guarantee that any employee at GS knows shit from shit. One of my old (now fired) Game Advisors once told a customer that only the NES Gameboy Advance SPs can play the Nintendo Classic GBA games. In fact, the higher up the ladder you get, the less they seem to know about games. Your best bet for a reliable opinion is to find one guy or girl in the store who seems to know what they're talking about and just talk to them. There's always at least one psycho gamer at each GS so just learn who it is at your store. And anyway do you really want someone else's opinion about a game anyway? That's what magazine reviews are for.

However, the important thing to remember is this simple rule: "Retail weeds out competancy and serves you idiocy." What this means is, any employee who is actually good at their job and loves games will be promoted from Peon to Head Peon very quickly. From there it's just a simple six months (on average) to Assistant Store Manager (ASM), and ASMs are the first on the list to manage a brand new store. In the end, anybody who could actually be of service to you is almost always scooped up and hidden from you.

One of the interesting facets of retail is that retail "grunt" employees generally think they're superior in some way to their customers. I find this happens in other industries too, most noteably shoes and clothing, but in the gaming industry the snobbery is particularly noticeabale. There's two reasons for this, from what I can fathom:1: Some wackos out there think that working at a game retail outlet is the single greatest acheivement of their young lives. They've dreamed of unlimited access to our inventory and now they've got it. As a result they generally seem to think they're "better" than everyone else because everyone else isn't working there, right?2: Publishing companies tend to make us feel pretty elitist by sending us promotional gifts, mostly crappy t-shirts but sometimes very decent embroidered dress shirts (I'm wearing a Halo 2 polo shirt at the moment), and sometimes even whole systems for free. My store recently got a Game Boy Advance Micro as a promotion, so that tends to make us feel pretty special. Which we're not, of course.

Mentioning someone's District Manager by name is enough to scare the shit out of almost any Store Manager. You can easily learn your District's DM's name by motherfucking asking someone. It's really that stupidly simple.

We are required, by our direct managers, to pitch a reserve and a subscription (to Game Informer Magazine) to every customer we see. Rarely do we actually do this, but some GameStop employees are known to sit on a customer until they cave. If this happens to you, the easiest thing to do is just leave the store, but if you've just got to have that copy of Pokemon Gold for the Game Boy Color then here's how you get us off your back:Reservations:Just say there's nothing coming out that you're interested in. That's usually all that's required. If the employee persists, or really starts to get on your nerves, play the District Manager card.

Subscriptions:Much easier. Just say you've left the card at home. I can't remember a single time this didn't shut the employee up right then and there.

What GameStop Thinks About You:GameStop's a company driven by numbers and managed by people who have never touched a game in their lives with the possible exception of that dollar they spent on Pac-Man during the 80's. As a result, they are woefully out of touch with the hardcore gaming market.

However, they are in touch with the casual gaming market. And the casual gaming market has the following characteristics:

1: They buy whatever has the best looking/biggest poster in the store. It's true I swear it.2: They also buy anything even remotely resembling Grand Theft Auto. This is why 187 Ride Or Die sold at all.3: They almost always hump PS2 Games. They don't buy PC and the only people who buy XBox games are the ones who already own a PS2. This is why all GameStops have the PS2 section close to the front of the store. Also evidently only homosexual 12 year olds buy GameCubes which explains why all our GC promotional signs are so brightly colored and why our GC game sleeves are that awfull color of orange.4: They do not have internet access nor do they read magazines, so they actually seem to want our opinion about games and need to buy hint guides.5: They always, always, always buy a copy of Madden every goddamn year. I don't know why this is.

This total ignorance of the hardcore gaming market is explained by management as a good thing in the respect that it allows the company to worry more about making money (very important if you want to stay in business) and less about keeping their customers happy (proven to have less of an impact on a company's lifespan). In other words, if all DMs were hardcore gamers we would've ended up with 100,000 copies of Magna Carta that wouldn't have sold. But this is just a sad attempt to cover up for laziness. Even the most psychotic hardcore gamer who would qualify for upper management would be educated enough to know he has to trust his marketing numbers.

In my opinion, you're more likely (but still rather unlikely) to get an understanding and informed employee at computer-related stores, mostly because of their association with computer hardware and their neccessary courting of the hardcore PC gaming market.

Remember: GameStop loves and rewards the informed, intelligent customer. But GameStop loves and fucking eats alive the uninformed.In closing, if you take anything away from this, at least realize that you should Protect And Endorse Locally-Owned Stores, as they are more likely to be staffed by people who love the industry and the product. Hell, you'd have to if you're going to try and compete against the WalMart of gaming.

I'm pretty sure I've gotten to everything but I'll of course take questions for the next few hours. Cookies and soft drinks are down at the front table if you like, but be quick 'cause we've got to clear out of here in time for Bingo tonight.

General Guidelines:Keep Your Fucking Receipt.We can actually look up older transactions but our system currently only saves about a month in the past. So fold up your receipts and keep them in the cases or something, just in case. Many potentially difficult or headache-enducing transactions can be easily managed if you've kept a paper trail. On this note, it's possible to return an item and still keep your original receipt by just claiming you need it for tax purposes. No employee should fight you on this.

GameStop and Electronics Boutique are very similar for reasons other than the fact that we now own EB. So shopping at either chain of stores amounts to the same thing.

WalMart accounts for infinitely more game sales than GameStop and EB put together. They make far more money off games, movies and music than any other single company. Whether that translates to better profits for the developer is a question I can't answer.

Any offer on GameStop.com has absolutely nothing to do with our retail outlets. So if there's a bundle or promotion online, we often can't match it at the store. System bundles offered through GameStop.com are generally considered to be the source of everything that's wrong with America, so keep that in mind.

There's a seven day money-back return policy on used games, accessories, DVDs and systems, NO QUESTIONS ASKED. So if you don't like a game you can bring it back for your money back, something like a free 7-day rental policy.

There's also a 90 day return policy for new copy or store credit on used games, accessories, DVDs and systems. In this respect you can actually "rent" a game for three months if you are prepared to exchange it for another one.

Many of you have noticed a plethora of stickers on the front of a game's case. While EB's a little more guilty about this than GameStop is, the main purpose is simple: marketing. If you get stuck with the last copy of a game, and it looks like GameStop or EB shot their wad all over its face, you can usually get a replacement case in the case of console games. Each store keeps a whole stack of these cases in the back just in case. It's not a small request so don't take any shit from a lazy employee on this one.Preordering:Unless a direct date is given to you, you can't ever trust release dates. Frequently our system lists a month, ie "March" as the release date which is our company's way of saying they don't know wtf. We're told sometimes by our DMs that a month's name means the first of that month, but that's bullshit and anybody who says otherwise is a damn liar. Some employees have been known to pull a date straight out of their asses, but that's a risk you'd have to take. An easy way around this is to ask for a printout of a system's release schedule, which we can easily do for you. That way you'll see exactly the same thing we're seeing.

There are some occasions when a release date changes. This happened in recent memory with Dead Or Alive 4. In our defense, DoA's original release date of early December (or whatever, I forget), was provided by the publisher. When it was pushed to the 28th, that was done so by the publisher, and not us. When it got pushed again to the 30th, we were yelling just as loud as you guys. Honestly, if we could, we'd like every game to come out exactly on time because that kind of reliability maximizes our profits.

Reserving does "guarantee" you a copy. But our company has also said in no uncertain terms that we can depend on a 75%-ish pickup rate on launch day for even the most popular games (and to be fair this frequently seems to be true) so we can "Oversell" (their term) reserve copies. This can actually work out in your favor, so if your store's unusually honorable about reserves, you can easily convince someone to sell you someone else's copy on release day anyway, even without a reservation.

What you preorder has nothing to do with the priority of your preorder. The day you reserve, however, does. So for example, if a person at my store preordered an XBox 360 Core Unit before someone else preordered an XBox Premium Package, that first person would have dibs before the second. In the case of GameStop-specific bundles, such as a 360 with, say, a second controller and a game: those are all the domain of GameStop Online.

You can, in fact, get your money back on reservations. You can also transfer a deposit onto another reservation. It's your money anyway. The Manager on Duty will almost certainly refuse to refund it in any way other than your initial method of payment, so Keep Your Fucking Receipt.

Promotional gifts frequently come to bribe for reservations. If the game you want doesn't have a promo gift, ask for a different one. Also, many people at GameStop forget about the promo shit in the first place so bring that up.

GameStop corporate determines how many copies of a game get shipped to a store depending somewhat on how many copies they think will sell, but mostly upon how many copies were reserved. This explains why Katamari Damacy was so hard to find; nobody preordered it.

In the end, a game reservation means about as much as a fart in the wind in most stores. But individual employees can have a serious impact on this facet of store management, so get a personal guarantee from someone.

The Game Informer Subscription

The GI subscription is not actually a terrible idea. The magazine's not the best in the world but it's of course nothing compared to, say, gamerankings.com or (gasp!) your own personal experience. However the main purpose of the GI subscription is not the magazine subscription (which, to be fair, isn't a subscription exactly as it doesn't automatically renew at the end of the year), but the discount card you get with it.

The "More Card," as the marketing jackasses at GameStop have labeled it, provides (ahem) 10% off all used games, accessories and DVDs as well as a bonus 10% in trade in credit on all trade-ins, all for the low-low price of $15.00. What this means is that it's our way of getting you back in the store under the arrangement that a "member" would save money by keeping his business exclusively with GameStop.

The reality behind the GI Sub is that, unless you buy at least $150.00 in used inventory a year, or really love Game Informer Magazine, it's a ripoff. We mention it every time because there's still a healthy amount of customers who've never heard of it. I realized just today that a customer who's been shopping at our store for two years straight had never heard of the card. Odd but true.Inventory Facts:Overstock's kept in the back so if they don't have it tell them to go check overstock.

One copy of every game (ideally) is kept open, on display, without the game inside. Companies do not provide us with display boxes so we've been pushed to this end. You can convince an employee to write "Opened" or something on your receipt if you're worried that the disc might've been scratched while rolling around in the drawers (not an impossibility), and as a result you'll probably be able to argue for the "Used" return policy of 90 days. Some games are opened and used as demos in the kiosk machines. This is done mostly to shut customers up when they beg us to try the game before they buy it. Again, you can easily argue for the 90-day return policy here. I have seen some customers get our "10% shopworn" discount as well on these games so shoot for that whenever you can.

If you can't find one in a GameStop, Hint Guides can be ordered and Barnes & Noble.

Trade In Credit comes pre-tax out of everything you buy. As a result it cannot convert into any other form (cash, credit, etc). So if you trade something in for TiC it's stuck there.

There's usually a glut of free demos lying around in the back room so ask for one next time.

We can hold any item of our inventory for 48 hours. So if a game you want comes out and you have no reservation, just call us and ask someone to hold it for you. Rarely we'll be unable to do this, but that's only in situations where we've recieved very little of an item, or just enough to fill reserves. Which does happen.

Pricing on all new games, accessories and especially systems are dictated by the publishers. If we deviate from these prices in any way, the distributor stops sending us copies of the product. Yes it's legal, yes it happens. When Max Payne 2 came out, Circuit City sold it for $19.99 new. Whole months went by until they recieved their second shipment. While you can sometimes find a small ($5.00 or less) difference in pricing in some areas, you can pretty much bet that all prices will be the same everywhere unless bundling is involved.

Employees have always had first dibs except where 360s are concerned. Everything else is theirs first and yours second so don't bother arguing; this job has precious few perks so we take whatever we can get.

Gamestop and EB Games suck. They are run by assholes that dont know shit about gaming and only care about getting your money.

Newsflash!

Welcome to corporate America! Thanks for stopping by!

Edit: Yes I do happen to work at a GameStop here in GR. Yes, what he says is pretty much the truth. There are a couple points that don't apply everywhere like our store, but the majority of it is good advice. You would be suprised how many people don't have the brains to figure out to hang on to thier receipts or even attempt to read them when they do have them.

There's a ton of opinion here presented as fact. Again, there's some good advice presented as well. I really disagree with the assertion that the company doesn't care about the hardcore gamer. The advice about the used return policies is off base in some respects, in my opinion. The notion that managers are "hidden" from customers boggles the mind.

I don't want to argue about it or anything. As much as it pains me, I know there are some among you that think I work for the evil empire or something. I think we can all agree on this: Any store is as good or bad as the people who work there.

I don't want to argue about it or anything. As much as it pains me, I know there are some among you that think I work for the evil empire or something. I think we can all agree on this: Any store is as good or bad as the people who work there.

I have to admit, I had some fun during my time as an EB employee. And I 'interacted' with a bunch of people I wanted to punch in the face. It was definitely...different, though. Retail in general is a very interesting thing.

And if you're bored, take a look at this via The Escapist. It's a look into the customers at a local EB (via a temp employee) and nothing more. Shows what the people have to put up with some days.

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"All opinions posted are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled."

Hidden management - that is truth. I got yelled at by my DM because I was 'having too much customer interaction instead of managing'. This guy's rant is the very reason why I now run GT. My first page was called Knightshade's Rants and I just biiiiiitched up a storm about my job as an EB manager.

As for the company not caring about the hardcore gamer...let me tell you a story about RMS. RMS is Retail Management Systems, a 4 day course in reverse psychology and how to properly break your employees and customers will. It involves a lot of "How do we feel about that?" and "Tell me why we feel this way?", "We've heard a lot of good things about Fantavision! Our other customer's love it!" (uh..we? Mouse + pocket?) It talks heavily about how the customer isn't always right, but you as a manager never are because that customer has friends and can talk somebody out of a purchase faster than you can talk someone into one. If you don't buy that, I'll tell you a story about a Gameboy return that illustrates it perfectly. After 4 days I not only felt ill about the company, I also wanted to quit. I couldn't believe the level of manipulation and outright lying they expected of us.

You are right though - the company, regardless of the field, is as good as the employees. I'm glad you work for a good one. I unfortunately did not, and it sounds like this guy doesn't either.

Ugh. That sounds awful. One of the reasons I left Barnes and Noble was to work with my current manager, whom I really like and have a tremendous amount of respect for. He spends quite a bit of time with customers. Heck, we're a low volume store, so now that the holidays are over there's only one person on in the mornings, either myself, the ASM, or him....so it would be awfully hard not to interact with customers

I LOVE Acts of Gord! Nobody has taken the retail 'experience' and turned it into something worth reading but him. Worth taking the time to look over (even though it's really, really old now) just for all the laughs.

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"All opinions posted are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled."

See, reading stuff like this reminds me of why I ditched EBgames and went to work for Sherwin Williams, going on my 4th year with the company, and I have never been so well compensated by a company that actually stresses customer service and taking care your customers and treating them like humans. I mean how else can I justify charging $50 for paint? :wink:

Actually all kidding aside, Ebgames wasn't too bad, and there are stupid customers in all walks of retail. I can say though that the game companies should take a step outside and look at how other industries do things. Not only do I have loyal and dedicated contractors because of the way I, and SW, do business, but I have retail customers who drive over an hour past 3 other stores to see me and my staff. I'm week to week with regards to which gamestore I'll shop at, and generally I find that Gamestop has the geekier and more "loserish" employees that I'd be embarassed to be seen in public with(yes I am over-exaggerating), where EB's are a little better kept and better spoken and I don't feel like a tool around them..

I won't even begin to start stories...

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"I hate cynicism -- it's my least favorite quality and it doesn't lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you're kind amazing things will happen." - Conan O'Brien

I have retail customers who drive over an hour past 3 other stores to see me and my staff.

And the truth is that would happen regardless of where you were at because you are good at what you do. We have customers like that at my Gamestop. Bottom line is that there are tons of places people can buy games. From the net to big box stores and everything in between. You better have superior knowledge/customer service because that's the only way you have a prayer of building loyalty.

Believe me when I say that they guy whose problem with his 360 I diagnosed last week after he had been tearing his hair out for days...the guy who was overjoyed enough to actually call me on the phone to thank me...people like that will go to some lengths to come back.

Miguided, this is no joke, but if that's the way you seriously treat your customers, and you actually want to be compensated reasonably for the work you do, and never have to work major holidays, or nights, then maybe you should go over to www.sherwinwilliams.com . We always want people that are willing to go that extra length for their customers.

No lie man, it's retail but not really, and the pay bump from Gamestop will more than make up for any discount or free stuff. As an Assistant Manager for SW I made more than all but one Manager at EB in my City.

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"I hate cynicism -- it's my least favorite quality and it doesn't lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you're kind amazing things will happen." - Conan O'Brien

LOL, thank you for the advice. Truthfully, I'm still trying to figure out what to be when I grow up....never mind I'm older than many/most of the folks here. I never worked retail until March. I signed on as a temp for a Barnes and Noble at a new mall. I ended up getting promoted to full time there and staued 7 months, but moved over to Gamestop to be in a smaller retail environment. Right now I'm learning an awful lot, enjoying myself, and I feel like there are opportunities with the company. If that changes eventually, hopefully I'll have a solid base to make a move at that time. My employment history is a bit bizarre though and I really need to establish more of a track record.

This was 2000, so the GBA was not quite launched yet, and watermellon colored GameBoy Color was all the rage. It is 10:00 on the nose and I pull the gates on the store. A lady waddles through the store entrance, smelling slightly of onions and casually tosses one of the original Gameboy Black and White Bricks onto the desk. She says:

"I just bought this on Saturday and I want to return it cuz it don't work no more. I don't have the box or receipt."

(We went over this receipt thing didn't we?)

I politely ask "Did you buy it used?"

She sighs and says "No. I bought it brand new." (who knew that 'new' was a brand?)

I ask: "Are you sure this is the right Gameboy? This model hasn't been on shelves for at least as long as I've worked here. Was the one you had color?"

She replies :"No. It was this one right here. I want my money back on it."

I flip the GBA over and surprise surprise...the serial number has even been filed off. Before I can even speak again she says : "Listen - my dad worked in retail for 20 years, and I know how this works. You HAVE to take this back. I want my money back now."

I try to be the nice guy. "I can give you *checks chart...using Gameboy Color Trade-in value instead of Brick trade in value of 6 dollars*...looks like 30 dollars trade in for it, but I can't return it for cash without a receipt."

She gets hostile and says "Give me your district manager's name and number right now boy."

Not much pisses me off more than being addressed in this fashion, but I keep it in check and provide the information she wants. I FULLY expect that my DM will back me as I was flexible but did not break policy. I come back from my weekend and the DM is paying a visit to my store personally. Why you ask? To write me up of course! Apparently she got the story that I was screaming at this lady and calling her racist names (yea, she was black) and refused to do anything for her. I explain my side of the story and get "Well, she filed a complaint so you need to sign this writeup for your file." I refuse to sign it and she writes on the paperwork "Refused to sign". She then slaps me in the face by telling me that she not only gave the lady back the amount of a Gameboy Color, she also GAVE HER A REPLACEMENT on top of it. Its tantamount to pulling $200 bucks out of the till and handing it to somebody because they pitched a fit.

Sadly, this wasn't the end of my Gameboy adventures. Let's fast forward about 3 months. A tall well dressed guy named Tim Thrasher (no, I'm not kidding, and yes, I do remember) comes in first thing in the morning and wants to return his Gameboy Color as he says it won't turn on. He doesn't have his receipt. (*shock*) but is sure he bought the warranty. No problem. I look up the customer in the computer. No ESA purchases in the last year. I tell him I'm still checking and pull out the paper copies. I check through the whole box twice and there is no warranty. Remembering my last adventure I decide to check the unit to see if it was something simple. I begin to open the units battery slot.

Mr. Thrasher: "What are you doing?"

I reply "Oh, just seeing if I can get it working for you since I can't seem to find your warranty."

I walk in the back and grab some batteries. I toss in the fresh batteries and a game and bam! The system fires up and works just fine. I show it to him and try to be the nice guy again.

I smile and hand him the unit : "Looks like it just needed some fresh batteries. You can take em, they are on the house."

He replies "Oh no, it was NOT working before. You SWITCHED em when you were in the back!! I want to see your manager!"

I reply: "I am the manager sir."

(Warning, hairy language below)

My store is filled with kids at this point and Mr. Thrasher replies:"And a sorry excuse for a fucking manager you are. I want my fucking money back on that defective gameboy. The guy who I bought the goddamned warranty from said I can bring it back for my money back at any point."

I say "I apologize for any confusion, perhaps I'm not understanding the issue. You'd like me to give you your money back for the gameboy?"

Mr. Thrasher: "What is it with you fucking people? Stop fucking with me and give me the goddamned money back!"

I say : "Hey, hold on. You can't talk like that in my store. I'll be glad to try to help you, but you have to stop cussing."

Mr Thrasher yells: "Don't you fucking tell me what to do! I'll do whatever I fucking want! Give me your district manager's number right now!"

My district manager flys out, writes me up again despite my side of the story, and pulls the same shit as the last GB customer.

The moral of the story? No matter what you do, it'll be wrong, and nice guys finish last.

Your DM was horrible, that's all there is to it. I've had a couple DM's with GameStop, and every one of them has always backed me up in those situations as long as I had done what I was supposed to do. I can only assume your DM was either incompetent or was purposefully trying to get rid of you by treating you poorly.

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Roger: And you should know, I have no genitals.Syndey: That's alright. I have both.

I can understand why you'd have some hard feelings (and maybe an aneurysm or two) about that. I've spent a lot of time working in situations that made me miserable and I'm not willing to do that any longer. I think I'd find it extremely difficult to work in an environment where my superior (i.e. the DM) wasn't willing to get my back in such a situation.

With all the 360 hoopla, I've had the chance to see (not directly) how my DM has responded to some angry folks. I had a run in with a customer last week, myself (not 360 related). I made the mistake of casually tossing a pad of post-its onto a counter and a customer took this as a grave offense, insisting that I had thrown it at them. My manager was in the store at the time. He said to me, "Did you do anything wrong?" I replied, "I don't feel like I did." He said simply then I had nothing to worry about.

No one in Upper Management will support you, regardless of your decision. So what's the point of even making the decision?

The company, corporate mentality and policy, has absolutely no integrity when it comes to selling to the customers, same goes for Gamestop. Every other day I was forced to whore something new and a lot of times they directly conflicted one another. Really makes employees look good to the customers. And when I tried to do something different I'd get reprimanded.

Truly, even in management your not much more than an overpaid sales associate monkey, and like I said, the pay wasn't that great.

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"I hate cynicism -- it's my least favorite quality and it doesn't lead anywhere. Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get. But if you work really hard and you're kind amazing things will happen." - Conan O'Brien